Sig Christenson: Coming through in the clutch

Nasser Hempel had wanted to be a soldier since childhood. Then in 1991, out of work and desperate for cash, he got involved with a group of men who pulled occasional armed robberies for cash. Just 18, he drove the truck in a stickup of a man outside a bar in Houston's Heights called the Spot and later was handed a 15-year sentence.

Now, in October 2006, he had to explain all this to a group of Army recruiters in Houston.

Is there any good way? Nasser, a thoughtful and resourceful man who went to night school as a teenager to earn his diploma and then became a voracious reader in prison, knew of at least one. Really, it was the only option, no matter how painful: Tell the truth.

"I honestly think the three reasons I wasn't told "no" right away was because 1) they knew I was being sincere and honest with them; 2) at this time I came in weighing 200 pounds with a mean left hook; 3) I brought up the Army waiver program, so they weren't in any rush to hurt my feelings."

They weren't in any rush at all. The recruiters were deliberate, making calls on a daily basis, asking Hempel for more paperwork and building a packet that in time would be sent to the Army Recruiting Command.

Still, Hempel got a break early on. There was a staff sergeant in the office who had grown up in some of Houston's rougher neighborhoods and had a good idea about Hempel's roots. Hempel grew up in a trailer park, and said even his own dad &mdash an undocumented welder from Mexico &mdash dealt drugs after losing his job in the oil bust era.

Hempel, then a fourth-grader, recalls those hard times as if they were yesterday.

"After my dad lost his job things got really bad for us. We got accustomed to going days without electricity because the bill couldn't get paid. We were on welfare and one Christmas we had people from the Mormon Church leave food on our doorstep because they knew our situation."

The packet went to Army Recruiting Command headquarters at Fort Knox, Ky., and one day in fall 2006 a high-level officer called Hempel. The Recruiting Command's spokesman, Douglas Smith, said it isn't clear from the records whether it was the command's top man. Sometimes, the commander will hand off an interview to his deputy.

In a process with many big moments, this one was the biggest.

"After introducing himself, he stated that he was the man who is in charge of all the recruiting and recruiters. At first I didn't know why I was getting a phone call from this person, but I did know he sounded important and had a catchy title to go with his job description," Hempel recalled.

"I was on a three-way conference call with him and (the staff sergeant). After we chatted for a bit, he stated to me that he was the one who would ultimately make the decision if I would be allowed to join the Army or not. Then it came.